Speaker: Catarina Pinto Reis (Faculdade de Farmácia da Universidade de Lisboa).

Abstract: Delivery systems is a broad field of research on the development of novel carrier systems for effective delivery of drugs for therapy or diagnostic but also delivery of active ingredients for cosmetic or food supplements. Delivery technology using nanoparticles evolved to become an integral tool for the enhancement of properties of drugs or actives, minimization of harmful side effects, and clearly bring superior outcomes. This communication is an overview of several examples of drug delivery technologies for oral controlled release, mucosal oral delivery, targeting drug delivery and transdermal drug delivery but also examples of cosmetics and food supplements using nanotechnology as main strategy. In addition to the potential beneficial use of each type of nanocarrier, attention will also be drawn to the question of how we should proceed with the safety evaluation of these nanocarriers since the current requirements seem to be adequate to detect the adverse effects but it is expected that all aspects of nanoparticle toxicology will be reviewed further in the near future.

Catarina Pinto Reis is currently Assistant Professor at Faculty of Pharmacy (University of Lisbon). She is a member of Imed-ULisboa and collaborator at IBEB (FCUL) research group. She is also an external consultant of Infarmed. In 1997, she attended the University of Coimbra (Coimbra, Portugal) and graduated in Pharmaceutical Sciences. Her doctoral studies were also undertaken at the University of Coimbra with several important international collaborations where she developed an interest in advanced drug delivery systems.  Those studies have been recognized through a number of national prizes.

Her research involves a multidisciplinary platform; it has been focused on design, development and biological evaluation of drug delivery systems for oral, dermal and transdermal delivery, with special interest on metallic and polymeric nanocarriers. Other interests are the establishment of animal models of cancer and metabolic diseases like diabetes and, recently, the development of nanocarriers with natural products for the treatment of skin disorders such as melanoma or for skin care like cosmetics. She is author or co-author of several articles, book chapters and inventor of patents.